…the stills & prose of our family days.

Monthly Archives: November 2011

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The last 5 years have gone into these lil darlings. I feel I can measure their growth and time in apples! From those first bites of soft, mushy applesauce, to the carefully and thinly sliced and peeled bits to the full on chomp on it straight from a tree. Thank goodness for the seasonal clocks that Mother Nature provides to help us keep track!

This November we have decided to join some of our pals in expressing our gratitude for the blessings we have in our lives. While I do keep a weekly running tab of the bigs and littles, I decided to start the conversation with Zuzu about what gratitude means and how important it is to notice the things in our lives that we already have and are thankful for. This took some explaining to clarify that we weren’t just starting an early letter to Santa and that what we were trying to think about is our blessing of the little babydolls we already have and love, rather than the ones on the shelves in the store we covet. Eventually we got there and now for the last couple of nights this past week she’s reminded me that it was time to talk about what we are thankful for. I thought I would gather this harvest of thoughts here for safekeeping. Or keep-saving as dear Zuzu refers to it, the blessing that her words often are! Below is a combination of her and my thoughts on the blessings in our lives. I’ll leave it to you to decipher who felt what.

1. Gratitude for the many facets of the mighty brain of Lovey, and particularly his mechanical know-how. How lucky am I to have a partner who can bake a pie and fix a car.

2. Gratitude for the myriad of people in our lives who help us function semi-reasonably day to day. We could not do it without you all!

3. Gratitude for when Daddy, Momma, the Quail and Chula cat all cuddle on Zuzu’s bed with her and no one or cat pees on it.

4. Gratitude for the Sistred! (which my girls will hereby be known as- Thank you very much Ms. Lopresti

This time of year, what warms my heart is the times when I happen to have a reason to go outside for a moment after the sun’s gone down. The glow inside our home makes me grin ear to ear as I hurry back inside where I belong.

I have a real love/hate relationship with haircuts and the girls. I find myself eyeing their sweet heads for weeks on end before finally asking if anyone is interested in a haircut. I need to be sure I can commit to it before I make the offer. It shouldn’t be this difficult, but emotionally it is. Probably because I only do it once or twice a year and at this age, even without my help they grow so quickly.

When both of the girls were born, their hair came out mirroring mine. Lots of chocolate brown hair wisps covered their tender heads. In the first few months as it came off and new hair grew in, with both of them it changed over to Lovey’s strawberry blonde locks. Everyone thinks they look like him- I’m the odd man out in family pictures. Truth be told, when Lovey was their age he was a towhead. White, white, white. Shortly before Zuzu was born, I was gifted a number of boxes of my childhood things from my mom and in the depths of those I found a little envelope that carried the locks from my first haircut. My hair- was strawberry blonde! I have absolutely no memory of this and was so surprised to see the different color. It made me realize that the days of having these sweet little strawberry heads is most likely numbered.

Thus begins the love/hate relationship with haircuts as I age them with every snip. About a year ago I took the girls in to a joint doctor appointment a few weeks after their fall haircut and the doctor looked at them and asked if Zuzu’s hair used to be the same color as the Quail. I was shocked- I hadn’t noticed how much darker it had already turned. That time I had given the Quail bangs and I think the heartshock of seeing my baby vanish into a toddler had caused me to stop eyeing them so closely. Sure enough though, I can see it, it’s just a shade darker. Everytime we cut it, I feel like I’m cutting off part of their babyhood.

Yet, I can’t quite help myself, as I eye it for weeks preceding the haircut I notice how straggly or thin it has become and feel the need to thicken and even it up. I always love the final result after I cry about it few a few days though. This fall Zuzu had been the one asking for a cut after I came home from work with one. It’s not a quick process for us. I do cut the hair myself, but I usually have to trail after them over the course of the weekend making little amends. Since Zuzu had asked, I started with her this time and noticed that her bangs were almost at the length I had hoped so that we could even it all out to one length. In reality, that was shorter than I pictured the cut as a whole. She was tickled. I was uncertain and Lovey asked why I took his little girl away. It’s a spritely little cut on her, but the bittersweetness of it going one more shade darker as I cut the summer sun out of it was enough to put me in my hair-cutting place before I got to the Quail. Needless to say, I only took a couple of inches off of her in order to keep the rest of my heart intact.

Sunday Still Life is an evolving photo project started by Erin. It’s an invitation to explore the beauty and depth of life through traditional still life composition and / or photos and words to evoke inner stillness and reflection. If you feel so inspired, join in!

Lately, all I see in my Zuzu is her fast-paced growth. She’s racing towards grown-upland and taking us all along with her. I’m oh-so-grateful for these moments that are fewer and father between where she just wants to be my little girl still holding on.